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May 15, 2005
EXCERPTS: Tradesmen of Bareilly
Sometime during the second decade of the 19th century, Robert Glyn, magistrate and judge of the district of Bareilly, commissioned one Ghulam Yahya “to write the true details of some of the craftsmen and the names of the tools of manufacture and production and their dress and manners”.
Ghulam Yahya, who describes himself as the “servant of scholars and the son of Maulvi Imad-ud-din Lepakni”, selected eleven trades/crafts and wrote an account illustrated with drawings of tools and paintings of craftsmen and named the book The Eleven Illustrations.
Whatever could show its face and make itself clear from the canopy of concealment through observation and investigations was entrusted to the tongue of the elegantly writing pen. I regarded this a cause worthy of pride. This book I called The Eleven Illustrations.
Kitab-i-Tasavir-i-Shishagaran Vaghairah Va Bayan-i-Alat-i- Anha (The Illustrated Book About Makers of Glassware, etc. and a Description of their Tools) is the title pasted on the hardcover binding of the manuscript. The Van Pelt Library of the University of Pennsylvania, USA, purchased the manuscript from a rare book dealer of London. It was advertised in the catalogue as a rare early 19th century cook book, written in Urdu. There was a painting of a man roasting kababs on iron skewers over a coal fire to authenticate the claim of the advertiser. The title pasted on the cover was not mentioned at all. When the manuscript arrived, it was a slim volume in good condition, comprising 35 folios, including illustrations.
Leafing through it, I immediately realized that it was no cook book though it did contain recipes for kababs and the painting of the kabab maker was there. The language of the manuscript is Persian, not Urdu. The calligraphic style is that of khati-shikastah, and can be classed as average student calligraphy. The text itself is not very difficult to read; but there are seven tables, giving prices of various items of merchandise which seemed almost impossible to read at first glance. They are written with a certain casualness, which would make even an expert reader of shikastah despair.
The prices of the merchandise are given in siyaq. Deciphering the price lists is like solving a complicated jigsaw puzzle, specially because the author uses a mixed vocabulary, giving Persian names for some commodities and Indian names for others, making the reader unsure of what to expect. There are still a couple of question marks regarding the reading or the meaningful reading of some words. The price list is as unique as it is rare, and makes the manuscript invaluable for scholars. In none of the official records, survey reports, histories, memoirs, journals or letters relating to the first half of the 19th century, do we come across a price list such as this one.
Our knowledge of Indian society during British rule in the 19th century has rested primarily on four sources; (1) the voluminous records of the East India Company; (2) the works of various Europeans; (3) the writings of many civil servants of the Company; (4) the accounts of Asians writing in this period. Interesting first hand and very useful alternative sources are accounts of Asians writing under British patronage or, as in our case, on receiving orders from a British administrator. The Kitab-i-Tasavir-i-Shishagaran Vaghairah Va Bayan-Aalat-i-Aanha occupies a special middle space in writings belonging to this particular genre.
Yahya’s account is brief, compared to other accounts relating to professional crafts in the early 19th century.
The scope of Yahya’s work is quite different from that of Martin or Skinner. He does not talk about the “smallness” of wages, the “wretchedness” of the dwellings of the wage earners, the scantiness of their food or clothing, the superstitions which “pervade” their minds and the alleged “immorality” that debases their character. His account of eleven craftsmen and their crafts is limited to a microeconomic zone, the district of Bareilly. The account is dispassionate and matter-of-fact. His emphasis is more on providing a description of the tools, which he does through drawings and by naming each tool and implement used for manufacture.
What prompted Yahya to choose just these eleven crafts/trades is a question that needs to be addressed. There could be several answers, the most obvious is that these were the most important crafts in that area. But if such was the case, why then include gram parchers? They can be found everywhere — even in present times and strictly speaking grain roasting cannot be called an important craft of any area. The same is true for kabab making. A kabab maker or a kababci hails from the bavarci community of cooks and has recipes for kabab, but professionally a kababci is as different from a bavarci as a crimper is from a tailor. Kabab making and selling is not an important trade, but a special one. This explains Yahya’s choice of a crimper instead of a tailor and a kabab specialist instead of a mere cook.
Excerpted with permission from Crafting Traditions: Documenting Trades & Crafts in Early 19th Century North India By Ghulam Yahya Edited, translated and with an Introduction by Mehr Afshan Farooqi Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts and Aryan Books International, New Delhi. Available with Indus Publications, 25 Fareed Chambers, Abdullah Haroon Road, Karachi Tel: 021-5660242, 4801429 ISBN 81-7305-249-2 127pp (38pp in Persian) Rs525
Mehr Afshan Farooqi holds a PhD in history and teaches in the department of Asian and Middle Eastern languages and cultures of the Virginia University, USA
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